The 3rd Citizen Cyberscience Summit: Feb 20 - 22, 2014

Day 1 - Thursday 20th Feb @ the Royal Geographical Society, London

On the first day we will set the scene - hearing from some of the leading figures in citizen science and exploring the process of public engagement and participation, outreach of citizen science to the developing world, and the undertaking of "extreme" citizen science projects, in rain forests, the arctic tundra, or urban jungles.

Day 2 - Friday 21st Feb @ University College London

On the second day we will look beneath the surface. Experts will discuss the hardware and software that powers citizen cyberscience. There will be panel discussions with citizen scientists about participation and engagement, and a showcase of new and future citizen science projects. Join us in the evening for the Citizen Science Cafe.

Day 3 - Saturday 22nd Feb @ University College London

On the third day we get down to business…together! The Hack Day continues with workshops about developing hardware, software, and Citizen Science projects; and an Open Space to work on ideas and challenges. We will wrap up the day with a Show & Tell and a Reception.

PARTICIPATE

There are many opportunities to contribute to the conversation during panel sessions, workshops, and the Citizen Science Cafe on Friday night. But the best opportunity to get involved is to collaborate with others on the Hack Day Challenges, or submit your own!

"the Citizen Cyberscience Summit in London has been one of the most lively and entertaining events I’ve attended in ages. Under the banner of citizen cyberscience in all its guises, we’ve heard about human computers from David Grier, finding prime numbers from PrimeGrid, now running to hundreds of thousands of digits, and from the founder of BOINC and SETI@home, David Anderson."

"Citizen cyberscience offers people around the world the opportunity to contribute to cutting-edge scientific research that may be of fundamental significance, as well as having applications relevant to their own lives. The Large Hadron Collider at CERN has already benefited from the contributions of citizen cyberscientists, and this event will provide an ideal opportunity to showcase this and other possibilities for more citizen cyberscientists to get involved in this and other scientific projects."

"Citizen cyberscience has great potential not only for scientific researchers but also for those working in the humanities and cultural heritage. By bringing together experts in the field, this summit will both advance the techniques of citizen cyberscience, and encourage public participation by publicising the various applications among a broader community. The Centre for e-Research at King's has a strong interest in supporting citizen cyberscience and we are delighted to be able to host this important event."

"There are already hundreds of thousands of people actively contributing to citizen cyberscience - we want to reach tens of millions. This event will provide a unique opportunity to brainstorm about how new technologies can enhance citizen cyberscience, and how researchers in the developing world can exploit this highly appropriate low-cost approach to doing science. One bold ambition of the summit is to draft a citizen cyberscience manifesto, involving all stakeholders in the field."

"We are very excited by the opportunities afforded by the London Cyberscience Summit. The power of the Internet and the growing public availability of scientific and other data has made possible the involvement of a wide variety of communities and citizens in a range of activities that can break new ground in public awareness and direct participation in important areas of scientific research. Public involvement and the democratisation of science seems yet another example of the way the internet is acting as a tremendous enabler in opening up whole areas of perviously specialised activity to public participation. We look forward to involvement in the summit and helping promote this already rapidly growing activity."

The Organisers

UCL's interdisciplinary Extreme Citizen Science research groupExCites brings together scholars from diverse fields to develop and contribute to the guiding theories, tools and methodologies that will enable any community to start a Citizen Science project to deal with issues that concern them. With an interdisciplinary research approach we aim to provide any user, regardless of their background or literacy level, with a set of tools that can be used to collect, analyse and act on information according to agreed upon scientific methods.

The Citizen Cyberlab is researching and evaluating online collaborative environments and software tools that stimulate creative learning in the context of Citizen Cyberscience. The Lab will pioneer open source platforms and tools that enable and enhance learning and creativity in Citizen Cyberscience, using four pilot projects as testbeds. These pilots, platforms and tools will then be evaluated in order to produce new understanding of creative learning behaviours, anchored in real-world examples of Citizen Cyberscience.

The Citizen Cyberscience Centre is a partnership established in 2009 to promote the use of citizen science on the Web, as an appropriate low-cost technology for researchers in developing regions. The CCC partners are CERN, the UN Institute for Training and Research and the University of Geneva.

The Mobile Collective brings people together to work on exciting new mobile and web projects. We believe in the power of collaboration. We are currently working with CERN, the UN, Imperial College London, UCL, and others as part of the Citizen Cyberlab consortium. Together we are building tools and platforms for Citizen Science and launching pilot projects in Particle Physics, Synthetic Biology, Humanitarian Disaster Mapping, and “Extreme” Citizen Science.